ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL (O-RVZ MOVIE REVIEW)

Alita: Battle Angel is a sci-fi fantasy film based on a Japanese Manga named "Gunnm" or also known as "Battle Angel Alita". The film is directed by Robert Rodriguez and is produced by James Cameron who directed films such as Avatar, Titanic, Terminator and the first Aliens movie. The film stars Rosa Salazar (Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials & Bird Box) as Alita, a centuries-year-old berserker cyborg and Christoph Waltz (Django Unchained & Inglourious Basterds) as Dr. Dyson Ido, a renowned cybersurgeon who put Alita back after founding her in a scrapyard.

The setting of the movie is set in a dystopian Earth after it was left devastated by the result of a catastrophic war called "The Fall" which happened centuries ago. Fast forward to the present time, this Earth is being divided into two different societies which are called the Iron City, the lower section of the Earth in which it represents the poor and chaotic society filled with junks and scraps being thrown from the higher section of the Earth called Zalem which represents the rich and wealthy people. I've never read the original source material of this film which is the Japanese Manga nor watched any of the Anime OVA but I still find the lore of it very interesting. It didn't really bother me that much that I have zero information about the movie which is a good thing on my side because I don't wanna put too much expectation of this film and admittedly, there are some parts of the film that really worked for me. To be fair, the movie isn't really that good but it isn't bad either. First of all, I'd like to point out that the cinematography and visual effects of this film were really top-notched. It's visually pleasing in the eyes and the cities were so beautiful to look at. Though this movie only showed the poor and disorganized Iron City, I still find it pleasing to see on the screen especially on a Large Screen format. Seeing Alita on the movie felt weird at first due to the anime-like structure of its eyes but as the movie goes along, it kinda grows on me. Her movements and fighting style were really smooth and flawless and I just really like how she portrayed Alita of being this very confused person/cyborg who has zero backgrounds of her origin but also shows her cute, innocent and bubbly-like attitude side that you just want to cheer on. If we're gonna talk about cinematography and visual effects, this movie really nailed it however, the movie also has these problems in terms of its plot, dialogues, pacing, editing, and a weak villain. The lore and history of the film's plot really intrigued me but I didn't like how they present it with bad editings and awkward transitioning of some scenes. Some dialogues were just really bad and the love story portion of Alita and her love interest felt weak. It's there but it was just ineffective as it feels not natural and was just forcefully progressed just to have some conflict story between the two of them at the end part of the film. The villain of this movie was also weak and I didn't feel any intimidating presence from the villain and even from the henchmen.

OVERALL

ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL is a gorgeous film to watch due to its beautiful visual effects and cinematography. There are some problems from the film due to its edits, dialogues and ineffective love storyline. It's not a very good film but also not a very bad film either. The fighting and action sequences were really good. The lore of the movie is rich and I really want to see more of it. In the end, I was entertained by the film and I'm really hoping to know more about the story of it if a sequel is going to be made.